Indian rat snake -mating couple....!

[Manjunath Dalawai]

Nikon L120 (compact) 4.5-94.5mm

[Mrudul Godbole]

Rare natural history moment captured. The rat snakes are not mating however. These are two males testing their strength with a view to getting the females. Where was this photographed? Thanks for sharing.

I had a similar sighting you can check the post here -
Rat Snakes - Indiawilds: Land of the Tiger. Conservation, Wildlife Photography, Communities (http://www.indiawilds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1238&highlight=snakes)

[Manjunath Dalawai]

Its near a small village 'sada' in bhimghad wild life sanctuary,.....
Thanks for your information. I dint know that those both are male. Its very surprising experiance for me while returning from that village i and my friend riding bike in jungle suddenly our bike skidd, and we fell down but few meter away from our bike on road these guys are fighting..,:-)

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

Nice moment captured.The rat snakes are in playful mood raising their head as best they could.Thanks for sharing.SaktiWild

P.S.:Snakes are intrinsically fascinating subjects for photography.I am so happy to see Manjunath Bhai has paid attention to it and I am sure more and more of our members who are such brilliant photographers will pay some attention to this rich component of bio-diversity of our wilderness.

In this context I may not be out of place to mention that there is a common belief that a cobra may mate with a rat snake if a suitable match in his/her species is not found in the area.I lived at Bagnan(Dist. Howrah) located between the river Damodar and Rupnarayana for long years which was virtually a cobraland during my childhood.I have seen and heard numerous stories about cobras but never come across or heard from the villagers/friends whose opinion I value,any incidence of such mating between a rat snake and a cobra.
Monocled cobras,though smaller in size( hood is also smaller) are definitely more temperamental than Spectacled cobra and express their resentment particulary to speeding bi-cycles on village roads.
SaktiWild

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Good that you saw them. In the childhood days we used to hear lot of these beliefs about cobra mating with rat snake etc. However, I don't know of any such actual records of these two species mating.

It seems that you were close. After falling from your bike, I must congratulate you that you thought of picking up camera to click.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi